An Instagram photo shows Assad and his wife surrounded by beaming children. (Instagram)

(Newser)
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Syria is in the middle of a bloody civil war—not that you'd know it from President Bashar al-Assad's new Instagram account, which features Assad and his wife shaking hands, hugging, and chatting with smiling constituents and cheering crowds, reports CNN. With 100,000 people now dead in the conflict and a million displaced, according to the Washington Post, Assad is now fighting a second front: a propaganda war. The Instagram account joins his popular Facebook and Twitter accounts, which feature similar images of happy Syrians and the photogenic first family. The only hint of conflict is in the occasional comment that slips past the moderators. "This is not the real Syria," says one comment, per CNN. "Show us the actual Syria, please."